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Chaudfroid of Salmon

A cold salmon dish served with a chilled sauce of anchovies, herbs, and egg yolks, garnished with egg whites, truffles, and aspic croutons.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 20 ingredients
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Why it works: Chive and capers match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 245 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Chaudfroid of Salmon

Ingredients

Directions

Poach the salmon

  1. In a pot, combine the salmon and salt, then cover with water and boil gently for 1 hour.

  2. Strain the liquid and let it cool.

  3. Place the salmon in a stewpan and pour the sauce over it.

  4. Simmer the salmon until cooked.

  5. Let it cool in the sauce until firm.

Make the herb sauce

  1. Wash, bone, and chop the anchovies with chives, gherkins, capers, tarragon, and parsley.

  2. In a mortar, pound the chopped mixture with the yolks of the hard-boiled eggs.

  3. Add butter, slowly mix in salad oil, tarragon vinegar, and season with salt and pepper.

  4. Pass the mixture through a fine sieve and chill until firm.

Assemble and serve

  1. Fry the slice of bread in butter until golden brown.

  2. Spread some of the mixture over the bread.

  3. Place the salmon on the bread.

  4. Cover with a thin layer of the mixture, smoothing it with a knife.

  5. Decorate with cut shapes of hard-boiled egg whites and truffles.

  6. Sprinkle with lobster spawn.

  7. Garnish with croutons of aspic jelly.

  8. Serve.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Chive + caperstop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together245 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Capers + tarragontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together379 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Tarragon + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Capers + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,550 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Chive + tarragontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together589 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Salmon
Forms the main body of the dish, becoming firm and flaky when gently poached and cooled.
Hard-boiled eggs
Yolks are pounded into the sauce, adding richness and a smooth, thick body.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth texture to the herb mixture and fries the bread golden.
Salad oil
Slowly mixed in to emulsify the sauce, giving it a smooth, creamy texture.
Tarragon vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the rich sauce and balances the oil and butter.
Anchovies
Contribute a salty, savoury depth to the herb sauce.

The step that matters

Let the salmon cool in the sauce until firm. Cooling slowly in the poaching liquid keeps the fish moist and lets it set firm, so the layers hold together when sliced and coated.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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